West Torrance looked like a machine in its march to the CIF Southern Section Division IV wrestling semifinals on Saturday.

Then the Warriors discovered a machine that hummed a bit better than they did.

After turning three early losses aside, the Warriors battled back but didn’t have the firepower to turn aside top-seeded Bloomington in a 44-24 loss at Irvine High.

“We knew they were going to be tough, they have an excellent program, they’re well-coached, but I can’t say anything bad about my guys,” West coach Brian Notch said. “They went out there and they wrestled, they weren’t intimidated and they just kept pushing. They kept themselves in the match and that’s all you can ask for.”

The Warriors were seeded fourth, somewhat of a surprise because in the final polling they were ranked third in the division.

In the first two rounds earlier Saturday, they looked like they had something to prove and rolled through Cypress 54-15 and took apart Schurr in the quarterfinals 58-18. The other Bay League representative, Redondo, fell to Arroyo 69-12 in the opening round.

While West was cruising, it still had to survive a dislocated elbow suffered by Lance Nelson in the quarterfinals, and then three decisive losses in the first three bouts against Bloomington.

Good thing West had a team captain like Yuuka Murai to turn to.

In his 145-pound match, the senior recorded a workmanlike 6-3 decision to turn the tide.

“I was thinking I have to step up to get our momentum back,” Murai said. “And I have to win this match so my teammates could look forward to me and keep pushing it.”

What West got next was even better from junior Barret Hamelton at 160 pounds. Hamelton was scoreless in the first period, fell behind by 3-1 after the second period and still trailed, 5-3, late in the third period when he scored a late takedown of Tony Leon to tie the match and send it into overtime.

It took only 14 seconds for Hamelton to score a two-point takedown to capture his battle.

“I knew he was tired, I knew I could beat him, there was no reason he should beat me so I tied it up and went into overtime,” Hamelton said. “I saw the look on his face – he was done.

The momentum clearly on West’s side, Chris Whilden promptly built a 10-1 first-period lead at 171 pounds. Along the way, he recorded two near falls.

He took the lead to 11-1 and was still up 11-5 when he was suddenly rocked and pinned with less than a minute to go in the second period.

“That’s wrestling. You lose some, you win some,” Notch said. “We battled back, battled hard, the guys kept fighting and put themselves in a position to win and sometimes it’s a battle of momentum. You get an 11-1 lead, and then you get caught and kind of get stuck there with the cradle and that kind of hurts, but I’m proud of the boys.”

Notch said Whilden might have actually recorded a pin before he was pinned.

“You know what? I think he did,” Notch said. “He had him stuck when he had him on his back and then when the kid put Chris in the cradle, I thought we had a defensive pin but the ref didn’t jump to that side. But what can you do? Chris still wrestled well, he’s going to learn from his mistakes and he’s going to be ready to go next week.”

West also got pins from Mo Faqhi (275), Matt Boeson (189) and Chris Lee (119) but Bloomington won six of the final nine matches.

“Yeah, it was a very tough team,” Murai said. “We battled and battled but just gave up a couple pins that we shouldn’t have given up. It happens.”

Twelve of the Warriors have qualified for CIF individual finals.

“I’m proud of the way we wrestled,” Hamelton said. “We’ve come a long way as a team. We’ve been getting better. We’re returning I think eight guys, and we can make a run at it next year.”

Join the Conversation

We invite you to use our commenting platform to engage in insightful conversations about issues in our community. Although we do not pre-screen comments, we reserve the right at all times to remove any information or materials that are unlawful, threatening, abusive, libelous, defamatory, obscene, vulgar, pornographic, profane, indecent or otherwise objectionable to us, and to disclose any information necessary to satisfy the law, regulation, or government request. We might permanently block any user who abuses these conditions.

If you see comments that you find offensive, please use the “Flag as Inappropriate” feature by hovering over the right side of the post, and pulling down on the arrow that appears. Or, contact our editors by emailing moderator@scng.com.